Pac-Man Cabaret scratch build - 100% complete!

[dmckean]

Looks great!

[Shun]

A small update to the Pac-Man cabaret:
A Pac-Man Is Born: Part 18. Fitting and wiring a Midway coin door -

Here is the coin door that I am fitting to the cab. The frame is a bit beaten up and everything is a bit rusty but its not too bad.



I used the jigsaw to cut the initial hole, rounded off the corners with the router and then drilled the mounting holes.



Test fit, although the frame doesn't fit too well because of the dents.



So a couple of smacks with the hammer straightened most of the dents out and removed a lot of the old paintwork as well



With the coin door fitted, the next thing to do was to wire up the service, test and coin door switches.
I mounted the non original switches to a piece of wood and then spliced the cable from my I/O board to both of the switches.
I then mounted this to the inside of the cab next to the coin door.





The wires on the coin door were old and crusty so I removed all them including the molex connector as I am using a socketed DIN connector.
I then added some new wires to the coin microswitches and wired them up to the DIN connector. I didn't bother with the coin meter but may do in future.





I then powered up the cab and tried out the coin, service and test switches and they all worked!

[harveybirdman]

You going to clean up and paint that door or leave the patina?

Yotsuya is an expert at refinishing those midway doors if you need any advice.

[Slippyblade]

Yotsuya is an expert at refinishing those midway doors if you need any advice.

Yeah he is, the one I got from him is gorgeous.  I've also got it fitted with an AnyCoin Mech and love it.

[DeLuSioNal29]

Good to know that Yotsuya does those.  I'm looking for a Midway coin door on my Super Pac and don't really have the time to refinish one...  I need to see if HE has time to do one (but I need to find one first!).

As for this project, I agree.  Glad to see it here.  I've been following his vids from the start on his Youtube channel.

DeL

[roknrol]

Good to know that Yotsuya does those.  I'm looking for a Midway coin door on my Super Pac and don't really have the time to refinish one...  I need to see if HE has time to do one (but I need to find one first!).

Not to thread dump ... But here's one.

http://www.ebay.com/itm/Bally-Midway-Coin-Door/262425654453?_trksid=p2047675.c100005.m1851&_trkparms=aid%3D222007%26algo%3DSIC.MBE%26ao%3D1%26asc%3D20131003132420%26meid%3D871f074480db4311afb4143c37b23905%26pid%3D100005%26rk%3D1%26rkt%3D6%26sd%3D282029711075

Not sure the reserve and it may not be the condition you're looking for.

[Shun]

Thanks for the comments guys. With regards to the coin door, I think I am going to strip the paint and sand the rust away and then either paint it myself or get it painted professionally.

[Shun]

Sooooooooo, I've been pretty bad at updating this project on here and on Youtube.
I forgot put update 19 on here back in September  . So, better late than never, here it is:

A Pac-Man Is Born: Part 19. Bezel and Marquee -

I got the piece of metal that will be the Bezel retainer, professionally folded to the correct angle as I thought this may be too hard to do with my home made metal folder. The guy only wanted £2 for this 
Also, I received the plexi for the Bezel and Marquee. The Bezel will be made up of a smoked plexi that the artwork will be attached to and a clear plexi to protect the artwork. Here is a quick test fit of said plexi:



And without the protective plastic:



Looks pretty good with the CRT behind it.

The Marquee will be two pieces of clear plexi that sandwich the artwork.

Speaking of artwork, that arrived not long after and I stuck the Marquee artwork to one of the pieces of plexi and put the other one on top. It even stays in place without any retainers  The light from the LEDs appears to work quite well as well:



Lastly I attached the Bezel artwork to the smoked plexi. This was a bit of a pain to do, but I got there in the end. The bezel is sitting a bit too high up in the picture below but this has since been rectified :



Part 20 will follow shortly...

[Vidiot]

Coming along nicely! 

[Shun]

Coming along nicely! 

Thanks. I'm getting there slowly but surely. Here is the latest update on the cab:

A Pac-Man Is Born: Part 20. Big update -

This is a catch up from the end of last year when I was too busy/lazy to post any updates and also recent work carried out on the cab.

Firstly, I add a couple of pieces of wood behind where the Marquee plexi will sit, so that it sits out further from the LEDs.
Then I got some cheap Aluminium L brackets, cut them to size and attached them with some security screws:



Then with some bigger security screws, I drilled two holes in the metal Bezel "retainer" and used the screws to hold it in place:





I wanted to work on the back of the cabinet next, but its such a pain having to drag the cabinet around with the monitor etc in place. So I decided to put some castors on the bottom of the cab. These might not stay on the cab but it makes it much easier to work on:



I then decided to redo the lower back panel with the holes for the vents. Someone kindly on my youtube channel linked me to a diagram that they had created with the correct dimensions. So I went out and bought a flush router bit and after creating a template, I routed out the correct size holes in a new piece of MDF. Before:



After:



Then I added some mesh behind the holes:



I then did a test fit of the back panel and created a whole so that the back of the CRT wouldn't hit it. I am going to try and replicate the "bubble" on the back of the original at some point. The back panel isn't quite perfect yet so will need some additional work:



Also, I took my control panel metal to a metal fabricator who kindly sharpened the fold/bend with a proper metal folder. This looks much, much better now:



Finally, I glued the front panel in place with the help of some wood screws for added strength:

[sealcouch]

This is looking great. I'd love to build one of these after I finish any one of mine. I wish I had such open access to scart TVs here in America.

[MaxRod]

would love to have the sketchup if its available.

[Shun]

This is looking great. I'd love to build one of these after I finish any one of mine. I wish I had such open access to scart TVs here in America.

Yeah, having cheap start TVs is pretty handy. Having said that Arcade monitors and dedicated Arcade Machines seem to be a lot more common and cheaper over in the states than over here. I'd swap Scart TVs for cheap dedicated machines any day 

would love to have the sketchup if its available.

I'll stick the sketch up model on the 3D warehouse when its finished. Reason being is that not all of the measurements are correct. If you look at my latest video, I had to redo a section on the back because I'd eyeballed it wrong. Hopefully once its finished all of the measurements will be correct.

[Shun]

Hello again 

This project is now finally complete. It's only taken about 10 years!
The Pac-Man has been sitting empty with all of the internals in boxes for the last 3 or 4 years ready for painting which I never did, until now.
I set myself a challenge of completing it before the end of the summer and I did!

A brief summary of whats in the cab:

It has an original Pac-Man PCB that has had a "Pacman Multigame Free Play and High Score Save Kit" installed (details of that board here: https://highscoresave.com/pacman-ms-pacman-multigame-free-play-and-high-score-save-kit)
A Wico stick
A restored Midway coin door
A 13/14 inch CRT. Albeit a TV using RGB scart. I actually have a spare monitor that is the right size now which I might swap in at some point
A new old stock control panel overlay
Repro artwork (might get front and side art resized from a full size cab eventually)
Went for Yellow paint instead of wood grain vinyl. Spray paint was a mistake though. I got a good finish in the end but it took ages. Should have used a roller.

I've uploaded a video to Youtube with some more pictures and videos of it working here:



Here is a link to the latest Sketchup model of the cab: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1nSsSfb9xi9P0gFC0-l__7d21OTenpitp/view

NOTE: The model is a little out of date. The "ears" of the cabinet are much smaller on the finished machine so they could do with trimming down on the model and the bottom vents were re-done mid project and I don't have the measurements on me at the moment. I can update the model at a later date.

Some pictures of the finished cab below: